Johnny Carson

John William “Johnny” Carson (October 23, 1925 – January 23, 2005) was an American television host and comedian, known as host of The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson for 30 years (1962–92). Carson received six Emmy Awards including the Governor Award and a 1985 Peabody Award; he was inducted into the Television Academy Hall of Fame in 1987. He was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1992, and received Kennedy Center Honors in 1993.

He began his performing career in 1950 at WOW radio and television in Omaha.^[3] He appeared on radio with Ken Case, an Omaha native who was later a news anchor and sportscaster in Monroe, Louisiana. Carson soon hosted a morning television program called The Squirrel’s Nest. One of his routines involved interviewing pigeons on the roof of the local Court House that would allegedly report on the political corruption they had seen. Carson supplemented his income by serving as emcee at local church dinners, attended by some of the same politicians and civic leaders that he had lampooned on the radio. The wife of one of the political figures owned stock in a radio station in Los Angeles and referred Carson to her brother, who was influential in the emerging television market in Southern California. Carson went to work at CBS-owned Los Angeles television station KNXT. He would later joke that he owed his success to the birds of Omaha.

In 1953, comic Red Skelton – a fan of Carson’s sketch comedy show Carson’s Cellar, which appeared from 1951 to 1953 on KNXT – asked Carson to join his show as a writer. Skelton once accidentally knocked himself unconscious an hour before his show went on the air live. Carson filled in for him.

Carson hosted several shows before The Tonight Show, including the game show Earn Your Vacation (1954), and the variety show The Johnny Carson Show (1955–56).^[4] He was a regular panelist on the original To Tell the Truth until 1962, and hosted the game show Who Do You Trust? (1957–62), where he met his future sidekick Ed McMahon.

In 1960, Carson was considered to play TV writer “Rob Petrie” in a sitcom by Carl Reiner called Head of the Family. Reiner starred in the pilot, but it was decided that someone else should play the role. However, on the suggestion of producer Sheldon Leonard, Dick Van Dyke was given the part, and the series was retitled The Dick Van Dyke Show.^[5] He was also a guest star in an episode of “Get Smart”!

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